


Old Dog, Old Scars

by sprouting



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Homophobia, lena's just really sad and gay, mentioned child abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-10
Updated: 2017-11-10
Packaged: 2019-01-31 13:04:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12682470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sprouting/pseuds/sprouting
Summary: Lena half believes that she’s earned this loneliness, this life, because of the way she looks at girls. It’s a slow road to acceptance for the youngest Luthor, but meeting Kara Danvers might be the catalyst that pushes her past her fear.





	Old Dog, Old Scars

**Author's Note:**

> a lena luthor headcanon that escalated very quickly

Lena is sixteen and she’s scared as fuck. Lex is her best friend but he's been away at college for three and a half years and she needs to tell him this Christmas because she needs to tell someone. She thinks Lillian knows because since Lionel died Lillian has come down harder and meaner than ever toward Lena (sometimes Lena even feels like she deserves it, but then she gets a hand across her face and she needs her brother again) and made comments and Lena is suffering so she figures that telling Lex is safe because he loves her and she needs to confide in someone. When she tells him he goes from casual and playful to angry. Like really angry. Like "Lena, you better be playing a joke right now because you cannot be that. You're not a pervert" and Lena gets so scared because she’s gotten used to Lillian hitting her but what if Lex hits her too (all she wanted was his love and acceptance, she didn’t think she’d fear him at the end of this conversation). She stutters something about it being a joke about how she doesn’t have a boyfriend because she’s so busy with school and it was funny in her head to make it seem like that wasn’t the reason. She throws herself more into school to make the lie seem more plausible and graduates a semester early, already done by next Christmas. She becomes the perfect daughter to Lillian. She and Lex don’t talk about it.

She meets Jack in the first week of college. He’s only a year older and they’re on track to finish their BA at the same time (in less than three years for Lena because she took her excuse to heart, focusing on work because if it keeps her busy then she can’t think about girls, can’t worry about Lex hating her, can’t spend time at home with Lillian because, although she’s stopped hitting her, she still controls everything about Lena’s life and it scares Lena almost as much as Lex does). When Jack asks her out, a year into their friendship, she says yes because she's supposed to say yes, because she’s supposed to think he's more attractive than the girl that smiles at her in the library or the barista in the coffee shop that she now avoids. She brings him home after another year and Lex positively beams. For the first time since she came out he's playful again, joking with both Lena and Jack, and Lena is so thrilled that she can almost quiet the voice that says that he's only happy because she's lying, because she's playing the part of some normal girl.

She’s been dating Jack for three years and they don’t fight. They don’t fight and she resigns herself to marrying him because their relationship might not have any spark but she's no longer a pervert in the eyes of her brother, who loves Jack, and Jack doesn’t force her to be intimate with him (they have sex sometimes, Lena feels like she has to, but Jack never pushes her). Maybe they don’t fight because she does what Jack says because she's afraid that if they fight this whole world of lies she's built will fall apart and she'll be left alone in her brother's wrath again, but the important thing is that they don’t fight so the relationship is stable.

Lex goes crazy slowly but by the time he's actively and publicly trying to kill Superman, Lena decides it’s time to break things off. She tells Jack it's over and doesn’t give him an explanation, just tells him that she needs out, and she packs all her things and moves into a small apartment above a chinese restaurant. Her family doesn’t know where she is and though she still sees Jack, is still friendly because she loves him, loves that he was always there beside her and loved her, she doesn’t tell him her address. She hasn’t had this kind of anonymity since she was adopted by the Luthors and it feels almost as good as she thinks being in love would feel. Lex gets arrested and Lena thinks about the last time she went to that coffee shop, when the cute barista wrote her number on the cup and Lena threw the whole thing in the trash without drinking it and suddenly she regrets everything. But being with Jack did more than ease Lex’s anger, it also won her good graces with Lillian and when Lillian asks Lena to meet and offers her the position of CEO at LuthorCorp, Lena realizes that all her lying was worth something, even if the original intention fell apart when Lex started making weapons. She only lasts in Metropolis for another six months before she begins planning the move to National City. She figures that she needs to get away from any Supers, and National City is sunny and beautiful. Maybe she'll meet another Jack there.

She fast tracks the moving process and is settled in National City in another six months, much to Lillian's annoyance. It takes less than two months (49 days to be exact) for Supergirl to reveal herself in the same city that Lena has moved to. Lena thinks she's cursed, or maybe the universe just enjoys laughing at her, because when she broke it off with Jack they were exactly 49 days short of their five year anniversary. Lena cries the whole night, cries because this has to be karma for being something as sinful as gay. She gets up the next day with a renewed energy and she throws it all into LuthorCorp. The idea to rename it to LCorp comes suddenly, in the middle of another meeting where the old white men that make up her board of trustees tell her that people still associate the name Luthor with Lex more than anything (it's been almost two years since his arrest, even longer than that since she last spoke to him, but she has to agree with those around her: she hears "Luthor" and thinks of her brother, stone faced, looking at her as if he can read her thoughts, right after she agreed with him that she was just joking about being a lesbian. It's been ten years and she's not sure exactly what his face looked like then, if her memory is right or if all the nightmares have distorted it permanently into a more demonic image). She goes through with the plans, gets ready for the rebranding, and then it all goes to shit.

Clark Kent is standing in her office and it's the first time she's seen him since Lex's trial. She feels that if she looks hard enough at his chest she would be able to see the S there, because of course she knows it's there, but she gets distracted from looking quickly by the woman beside him. It would make sense if another journalist was with him, maybe if he had a bodyguard for appearances (she is a Luthor, after all, and if she were anyone else she might not put it passed herself to attack him, either of his personas, for putting her brother in jail), but when the woman with him reveals that she's neither of those things, nor anything else that would make any sense, it's as clear who she is as it would be if she took off her cardigan to reveal the famous house crest. Lena stays calm and collected with the Supers in her office, but inside her head a voice laughs; it really must be karma that the most beautiful woman she's ever seen is someone that already hates her, someone she is more likely to be arrested by than someone she could kiss. It's almost funny, one Super for each Luthor, one Super to take each Luthor down. Lena knows she won't be going crazy like Lex, but she imagines that Kara, Supergirl, could destroy Lena with a smile as easily as if she had a gun.

But it doesn’t work out that way. Sure, sometimes Kara leaves her office and Lena cries the whole night, and she still has those nightmares of Lex, fangs flashing as he calls her a pervert, claws ready to rip her apart, but Kara becomes a friend. If Lena hadn’t put together the pieces instantly, before she ever got to know Kara, she might have a hard time now recognizing her as the superhero, because Supergirl is supposed to hate Lena Luthor, but Kara Danvers is all soft and warm and kind to Lena all the time. She strips away her own biases almost as quickly as Kara does, and Lena thinks maybe friendship is enough, because even that is revolutionary between a Super and a Luthor. When Jack comes back into her life, years after she'd last seen him, almost as long since they had last spoken, she's nervous not because she's going to see her former and only boyfriend, but because she couldn't stop herself from bringing Kara along and she thinks that he'll see right through her, see how badly she's fallen for her best friend, for a goddamn Super. He doesn't, but he isn't truly himself either, so Lena is left with what ifs. What if he had come back genuinely and seen her with Kara? What if he had known? Would he tell her to go for it, or would he have left her feeling as broken as Lex had? She loses Jack all over again and it feels almost like her web of lies has died with him. It has, mostly, but Lillian is still around, although Lena continues to hope that Kara will finally bring her down like Superman brought down Lex (maybe Lena doesn’t have to be the Luthor that Supergirl stops. Maybe Superman had Lex and Supergirl has Lillian and Lena doesn’t have to be a Luthor this time around) and Lena will be free from the Luthors in every arena except for in her own dreams. She mourns Jack, but she mourns herself just as much.

Alex and Maggie have been engaged a mere two weeks when Kara invites Lena to game night. Lena wants to remind Kara that she's a Luthor, that her mother and brother and probably Lionel as well are all evil, that Lena just got Kara's boyfriend sent permanently into space right after nearly marrying him (that's become her newest nightmare. When she lost Jack her nightmares of Lex faded away, but to nearly be paired with another man, one that is nothing like Jack, all ignorant and condescending where Jack was forgiving and kind, is enough to send her into panic every night. She had originally thought that National City could replace Jack, give her a new beard, but she's stayed single since moving two years ago, both to her delight and fear. She never considered Mon-El, Mike [she had a harder time working out which name to use around which of Kara's personas than she's ever had with either of the Supers], as someone she could even pretend to be with). But she says yes to Kara's invitation anyway, and allows herself to settle in beside Kara on the couch an hour before the rest of the superfriends are meant to arrive (Kara can always tell when Lena's nervous and she doesn't know if it's her racing heart or the fact that Kara knows her better in less than a year of friendship than Jack knew her after five years), ready to watch an episode or two of Bob's Burgers to trick her mind into relaxing before game night beings. When Maggie and Alex arrive wearing matching rings Lena tries to ignore it, but she's thrown for a loop every time the couple leans in close and when she finally makes it home at the end of the night she collapses against her door and sobs. Alex and Maggie? definitely not perverts.

She's invited to more game nights and she learns to relax around Kara's friends, eventually stops staring at the happy couple. She makes friends with Maggie, easily forgiving the cop for arresting her. It's easy to forgive that when she knows the whole circumstance, the video, and the fact that she half expected Clark Kent to arrest her the first time he showed up with Kara in tow. But her friendship with Maggie is what led to the teasing and to the full on panic attack because Maggie jokingly tells her to stop making heart eyes at Kara (thankfully it's just Maggie and Lena out to coffee. The comment had been triggered by Lena looking absolutely giddy after Kara texted her a paragraph of only heart emojis). Maggie knows what to do and gets Lena to calm down before bringing her home. Settled on her own couch, drinking a cup of tea made by her friend, Lena thinks maybe she's in the clear, maybe this is an incident like the one with Lex, one that they'll never discuss again. But no, Maggie is persistent, and when she settles beside Lena, pulling a blanket around them both, she lets out a "that the first time you've ever been called out on how gay you are, Luthor?" (Maggie won't stop calling her Luthor, and Lena's so grateful. At first it felt like a knife every time, like a claw from that nightmare-Lex digging into her side, but with time she begins to associate the name with herself, with friends, with Maggie's dimples as she wraps Lena up in a side hug) and Lena, too tired after the panic attack to fight the inevitable, just nods slowly. Maggie kisses her temple and they watch Brooklyn Nine-Nine in a comfortable silence.

On the surface, Lena comes out slowly, but behind the curtain Maggie is dragging her out as fast as possible and Lena resists like there's nothing else she'd rather put her energy into. When Kara finds out Lena half fears that she'll be cast out of the superfriends like she was nearly cast out of the Luthor family (she finally got a therapist and that's the only thing that's stopping her from panicking and lying more, safeguarding herself against rejection like she's done her whole life. Her therapist tells her it's okay to be afraid, but she has to be rational about it right now, because logically she knows her friends wouldn't judge her for this), but instead Kara hugs her and says that now they can dish about all the cute female celebrities they would date (Kara is bi, something Lena never knew before. It's a shock and she nearly cries in relief on the spot but Kara is ranting about how pretty Alycia Debnam-Carey is and how she's always liked brunettes best and this isn't the time to start sobbing). She's never felt so far from perversion, so far from her brother and her lies and her fear, so when she leans over and captures Kara's lips with her own she forgets to worry about what anyone else thinks.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this during the hiatus on tumblr messenger to my friend. I don't write, so sorry.
> 
> thanks for reading, y'all


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